In Paddy Conaghan’s Opinion column (BSj, 12/04) he mentions how the USA is missing a business opportunity when President Bush turns his back on global warming and that ‘it’s lost its chance to make a lot of money….’

I have been waiting for one of the global warming alarmists to express the real commercial aims behind their propaganda for some time.

A small English lobby in this Institution has over indulged in global warming evangelism. Their views have not been challenged sufficiently, since the principles to reduce CO2 emissions are often, although not always, consistent with the majority of members views on sustainability and conservation.

Our members should keep an open mind on global warming related to man-made emissions and respect that the scientific community is divided. There is a need for balanced decision making. We have a multi-national membership and blatantly indulging in international politics from an English base is foolhardy.

Those who are on this environmental and global warming bandwagon should feel exposed when their mission is simply to make a lot of money from it or when using it as a sales front-end to promote the rest of their business.

We must continue to strive for greater energy conservation and develop more efficient forms of energy usage. We are likely to be more successful if skills are re-deployed back from the environmental bandwagon to innovative and value for money design.

J H R Hampson, FCIBSE, Kinross

Source

Building Sustainable Design